Bias Against Women in American Educational History--A Propaganda Analysis.

Thum, Gladys E.

A dissertation study done by the author examining the bias against women in American histories of education is discussed in this paper. The educational histories selected for the study were categorized by recognized high professional quality and high academic status. Each book analyzed concentrated on different subject areas of educational history, and all were current except one. The first hypothesis of the study was that both pre-World War II and modern American histories of education, under bias and propanganda analysis, reveal bias against women. The second hypothesis was that this bias propaganda in modern American histories of education used, both quantitatively and qualitatively, a significant slanted historical approach that lacked professional objectivity. The third hypothesis was that modern American histories of education showed at least as much bias against women as that found in the pre-World War II American education histories, despite social, economic, political, and educational changes in the roles and status of women. All of these hypotheses were supported by the findings. (TS)